Bug#905178: apt-cacher: prompting due to modified conffiles which were not modified by the user: /etc/default/apt-cacher

[Mark Hindley]

control: tags -1 pending

Bug#905178: apt-cacher: prompting due to modified conffiles which were not modified by the user: /etc/default/apt-cacher

[Andreas Beckmann]

Hi Mark,

On 2019-03-24 10:31, Mark Hindley wrote:
> On Sat, Mar 23, 2019 at 07:00:53PM +0100, Andreas Beckmann wrote:
>> you probably need to take care of the config files installed by older
>> versions, here I could still trigger the bug on upgrades from squeeze to
>> wheezy to jessie to stretch to buster.
> 
> Thanks for pointing this out. Just so we don't have to revisit it again in the
> future, how far back do you think this needs to go? lenny? earlier?

I'm running multi-distro-upgrades in piuparts starting from lenny (which
also exhibits this bug), I do not intend to go back further :-)

Andreas

Bug#905178: apt-cacher: prompting due to modified conffiles which were not modified by the user: /etc/default/apt-cacher

[Mark Hindley]

Andreas

On Sat, Mar 23, 2019 at 07:00:53PM +0100, Andreas Beckmann wrote:
> you probably need to take care of the config files installed by older
> versions, here I could still trigger the bug on upgrades from squeeze to
> wheezy to jessie to stretch to buster.

Thanks for pointing this out. Just so we don't have to revisit it again in the
future, how far back do you think this needs to go? lenny? earlier?

Mark

Bug#905178: apt-cacher: prompting due to modified conffiles which were not modified by the user: /etc/default/apt-cacher

[Andreas Beckmann]

Followup-For: Bug #905178
Control: found -1 1.7.20

Hi,

you probably need to take care of the config files installed by older
versions, here I could still trigger the bug on upgrades from squeeze to
wheezy to jessie to stretch to buster.


Andreas


apt-cacher_1.7.20.log.gz
Description: application/gzip

Bug#905178: apt-cacher: prompting due to modified conffiles which were not modified by the user: /etc/default/apt-cacher

[Andreas Beckmann]

Package: apt-cacher
Version: 1.7.18
Severity: serious
User: debian...@lists.debian.org
Usertags: piuparts

Hi,

during a test with piuparts I noticed your package failed the piuparts
upgrade test because dpkg detected a conffile as being modified and then
prompted the user for an action. As there is no user input, this fails.
But this is not the real problem, the real problem is that this prompt
shows up in the first place, as there was nobody modifying this conffile
at all, the package has just been installed and upgraded...

This is a violation of policy 10.7.3, see
https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/#behavior,
which says "[These scripts handling conffiles] must not ask unnecessary
questions (particularly during upgrades), and must otherwise be good
citizens."

https://wiki.debian.org/DpkgConffileHandling should help with figuring
out how to do this properly.

In https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2009/08/msg00675.html and
followups it has been agreed that these bugs are to be filed with
severity serious.

>From the attached log (scroll to the bottom...):

  Setting up apt-cacher (1.7.18) ...
  Installing new version of config file /etc/apt-cacher/apt-cacher.conf ...
  
  Configuration file '/etc/default/apt-cacher'
   ==> File on system created by you or by a script.
   ==> File also in package provided by package maintainer.
 What would you like to do about it ?  Your options are:
  Y or I  : install the package maintainer's version
  N or O  : keep your currently-installed version
D : show the differences between the versions
Z : start a shell to examine the situation
   The default action is to keep your current version.
  *** apt-cacher (Y/I/N/O/D/Z) [default=N] ? dpkg: error processing package 
apt-cacher (--configure):
   end of file on stdin at conffile prompt
  Processing triggers for libc-bin (2.27-5) ...
  Processing triggers for ca-certificates (20170717) ...
  Updating certificates in /etc/ssl/certs...
  0 added, 0 removed; done.
  Running hooks in /etc/ca-certificates/update.d...
  done.
  Errors were encountered while processing:
   apt-cacher


cheers,

Andreas


apt-cacher_1.7.18.log.gz
Description: application/gzip